Friday, October 15, 2010

Mortgage Refinancing

Most of the home owners, especially in these days, are considering a mortgage refinancing. Because of high interest rates, the need of refinancing mortgages has become very popular. However, many homeowners are scared or nervous about a mortgage refinancing and dare not to ask about it from anyone. Here are the some reasons for refinancing a mortgage can be very comforting. It is very simple if you're a little prepared.

Getting a Mortgage refinancing is a process of giving a new home loan on favorable terms to replace your existing mortgage. This gives you many options to the owners to rebuild their financial situation. When refinancing a mortgage, homeowners reduce their payments for home loans by reducing interest rates on home loans and reducing the loan term.

The most popular reason why people do the refinancing is, to reduce their monthly mortgage payments. This is usually done by reducing the interest rate on the mortgage. The lowering of interest rates to 1% can make significant savings to the property, and makes refinancing profitable. Another way to make the monthly payments get reduced is by extending the total duration of the mortgage. Modifying a loan of 15 years in to a loan of nearly 30 years to reduce the monthly amount by half is a nice way to repay the loan.

Some owners have the opportunity to receive a refund in cash for refinancing of mortgages. People who have lived in their house for a while, and intend to remain there, often using mortgage refinancing. A large number of persons, who are obtaining a refund of mortgage refinancing, can use it how ever they want. This money is usually at a rate much lower than traditional personal loans would be available. Cash Back Mortgage refinancing is an excellent opportunity for an owner, a large sum of money to acquire, fast, and low interest rates.

Despite all the great possibilities of refinancing a mortgage, many homeowners are afraid to do. Many people are convinced that the refinancing is a waste of time, money or both. The truth is that refinancing a mortgage, if you can do correctly, you will get incredible savings. In addition, the actual process of refinancing a mortgage much easier than you think it is. It is very similar to buying a new home. Owners need to collect documents in order to respond and be ready a few simple questions and general financial reports. In fact, for a refinancing, homeowners often have more than one choice as a lender or a bank that can work with them. This can often lead to the property in a new economy, a lot of money to refinance mortgages, which will cost in a better financial situation.

Mortgage Refinancing, especially in these days, it will be very useful for many people. People should see themselves in a variety of mortgage banks and lenders, to where you stand with each other, and funding opportunities are the best, and cost. Refinance home loan is an excellent opportunity for an owner to obtain a better financial situation, both long and short term. If you've got a home, have a little prepared, refinancing can bring huge benefits.

Mortgage Refinance Loans

You have a home. You have a mortgage. You're paying on time. But know you have been confronted with new expenses. A Mortgage refinance loan is what is used to recalculate your finances and sustain you without breaking you now or down the line. When reaching for these loans your initial balance owed is increased and takes on a new body in regards to the terms and payments options.

Those forking out healthy interest rates for their present mortgage, or those who need cash, or want to consolidate one's debt will sometime be advised to exercise their mortgage refinancing facilities. One of the goals is to get better terms and to once again comfortably pay off all your debts.

So when should you refinance? Those of you who have an adjustable rate plan would be wise to consider the option of a fixed rate plan. Though this would be a nice time to refinance, these are many things you must take into account when going through the motions.It's very imperative that you know the answers to some very important questions first.

What amount of time do you expect to be in your current home? How much have you done to help slow depreciation in your home? How flexible are you willing to be for a lower interest rate? Have you weighed the pros and cons associated with the preferred lower payments with the variable balloon payment at the end?

If you are on an adjustable rate plan and you don't plan on sticking around after a few years of so you probably should opt out. You probably shouldn't make these decisions at all in the first year of any mortgage plan. As time goes on interest rates will change. So it may in your best interest to lock in a fixed rate now. The variable rates will always fluctuate, wavering up and down as the market changes.

Without a fixed rate you may see a change in your monthly payments you may not. Each individual situation will not be the same.

Choosing Mortgage Refinance Lenders

Mortgages come in many different forms. You have adjustable rates, fixed rates, balloons and many others. Mortgages are specific loans that allow people to buy homes and pay over time. Many problems can occur that would lead you to refinance the current mortgage loan you have. For this, you need to find mortgage refinance lenders.

One of the most common reasons for refinancing is the desire to reduce the current cost of the mortgage. You may have higher interest rates on your current mortgage than what the current market rates are. Lowering interest rates on mortgages lowers the monthly payment and total amount of the loan. Keep in mind, however, that refinancing your home essentially means you have to start all over. If, for example, you've already paid on your current mortgage for 5 years, you wipe the slate clean; you don't get to carry that time over to the refinance. Choosing the right mortgage refinance lenders can help reduce the damage though.

Tip #1: Investigate
Checking out potential lenders should be one of your top priorities. If you don't investigate every lender you're considering, you could literally wind up losing your home completely. The Better Business Bureau is a good place to start. While a lender needs to have at least 5 years of documented history to be considered legitimate, you can still find out if complaints have been files.

Tip #2: Educate Yourself
Never try to find mortgage refinance lenders without understanding the mortgage process. Learn about refinancing. Stay current with the market conditions and rates. Determine exactly what you want and stick to it. Educating yourself will help keep you from getting stuck with a refinance you didn't want.

Tip #3: Negotiate
Many desperate homeowners make the mistake in settling for whatever refinancing offer they can get. First of all, you should compare offers from multiple mortgage refinance lenders and choose the one that best suits your particular needs. Beyond that, you have the ability - believe it or not - to negotiate many terms and conditions in your refinance offer. Don't settle for the easy way out.

Tip #4: Popularity
Popular isn't always better. There are many different kinds of companies that will be available for refinancing. Unfortunately, most of them aren't actually lending institutions. They are usually broker or locating companies that work with different lending institutions to find mortgage refinance lenders that will refinance your mortgage based on your desires. These companies don't always work to your best interest. They may help you cut back on the time it takes to secure refinancing, but generally they aren't in any position to negotiate anything with the lenders.

Mortgage Refinancing

Home mortgage rates are currently near historic lows and have remained at these low levels for several months. As the result, many people are eager to refinance their current mortgage loan to lock in a low rate. For those in an adjustable rate mortgage, timing may never get any better to refinance out of this mortgage product and into a more conservative and consistent 15 or even 30 year mortgage loan.

When deciding to refinance a home mortgage, be sure to understand the refinancing costs associated with doing so and then try to limit them as much as possible.

Refinancing an existing mortgage is very similar to securing an initial mortgage. In fact, your new mortgage will be used to pay off your existing one, so it is just like buying your home all over again. As such, there are certain costs associated with a refinancing, just as there was when the original mortgage was secured.

Closing costs such as broker fees, appraisal fees, title search, inspections, and various administrative fees are all part of the fee structure associated with a mortgage refinance.

To reduce your closing costs and any other mortgage-related fees, trying following these simple tips:

1. Try to refinance with your existing lender. They will want to keep your business and if they know you are looking to refinance, they will be motivated to offer the lowest rate possible and reduce your fees to keep you onboard with them.
2. Take a look at your credit report to ensure there are not issues you are unaware of that might detract from you score. A high score will help you secure the lowest possible interest rate and this could save you thousands over the term of your loan.
3. Do not hesitate to negotiate your fees. Many mortgage-related fees are controlled by the mortgage company so they have the ability to lower them. "Administration fees" are especially easy to get waved or reduced.
4. Ask your lender to wave your first month's mortgage payment. Depending on your circumstances and type of loan, this is certainly a possibility.
5. Avoid having your closing costs included in your loan balance. Sure, this is a great way to avoid them altogether but the reality is that you will by paying for them each month during the length of your loan and with interest included, you will end up paying a lot more in the long-run than if you had just paid them out of pocket up front.

Mortgage Refinancing

You may find this short refinance a timely remedy for you if you are indebted to your mortgage lender than the current value of your home.

What Short Refinance is.

It is a negotiation process in which you go into with your present lender expecting them to reduce your mortgage payoff amount and giving you the freedom of refinancing with another lender at a lower loan balance. How short refinance is done. How to get a short refinance may certainly appear very difficult in most cases while in some impossible. This is because many lenders do not simply want to agree at all.

However, few others may consider it as an alternative. It is mandatory that you have an obvious financial need to be considered for a short refinance which may be financial hardship, health issues or age related issues (fixed incomes). In some cases of many major banks you may need to first apply for a short refinance only if you have first been disqualified for a loan modification. That is you will be place under a probation where you make the modified payment for around three months for a loan modification while your bank gets through with the approval process. This could impose some problems sometime

Where the disappointment occurs is when the bank comes back to them at the end of the probationary period to demand that they need to come in with the difference between what they had paid for the past three months and what they should have been paying and tells them that they could not get the final approval In many cases this amount can cause mortgage default because of its hugeness.

Here, short selling or completing a loan modification may be the only options you are left with for those banks that would not accept short refinance. Creativity is highly expected of you. If you would chose short selling which may not be wrong, you may need to choose an investor to work with. Probably, a great opportunity may open up for you to sell and buy back from the investor at a reasonably already decided price. This may not sound so wonderful and safe but it could lead to saving some reasonable amount in your mortgage. Then you may think, it was worth the risk at the end.

Debt Relief - Debt Settlement vs Mortgage Refinance

No financial planner would ever recommend a mortgage refinance (one form of debt consolidation) to get out of credit card debt. It is substituting secured debt for unsecured debt and you could lose your home over a bunch of unsecured credit card debt if you get injured or can't afford your new higher monthly payments.

Also, and these are verifiable published reports, 77% of all people who refinance their way out of credit card debt are right back at the same level of credit card debt 2.5 years later on average only now with less equity in their home. So it obviously isn't fixing the problem.

why?

Because no behavior modification was needed. You made it too easy on them to just refinance out of cc debt. No financial planner will ever recommend that route.

In settlement though they have to go without using credit cards for 2 to 3 years and do go through behavior modication. Credit counseling entries on your credit report are as bad as bankruptcy entries. They will crash your FICO for 10 years and take you from a 700 FICO down to low 500's literally overnight.

Debt settlement on the other hand is only a late pay on your credit report. Late pays bring down a 700+ FICO about 40-50 points, they bring down 600+ FICO's about 30 points, and bring down 500+ FICOs about 10-20 points. But more importantly, the FICO goes back up more than the drop from late pays as we eliminate the debt so their debt to income ratio goes down to zero and their FICO is back up higher than it was before they joined a settlement program even with the late pays on there,
but we demand a withdrawal of the late pay entry as part of the negotiated settlement and get that 99% of the time.

Superior Debt Relief is the only debt settlement company that pays for three levels of credit restoration afterwards to bring the FICO up even higher.

Settlement is one of the methods used by mortgage consolidation people to get someone qualified into a home that was denied financing due to too high of a debt to income ratio.

Bad Credit Mortgage Refinance Loan

If you intend to acquire a bad credit home mortgage loan, here are some facts that you should know.

You probably are defaulting in payment for your current home loan and your property may be on the verge of foreclosure due to the default in payment. You may have a very bad credit rating. What you need now is definitely a bad credit home mortgage loan to assist you.

If you have a bad credit history, it will be definitely difficult to acquire a home refinancing loan. If you really are in desperate need to acquire such loan to save your house from foreclosure, then the below details will definitely be useful to you. Continue reading to know more.

Talking To Your Current Lender

Searching through the internet to find a new loan provider to provide a refinancing loan to help preventing foreclosure of your home is normally what most people will do. However, it will be better if you could approach your existing lender for help instead. Being your current lender, they will definitely try their best to maintain the relationship with you and find ways to help you out. They will understand your financial situation better than any new providers you may have found because they have your records with them. Your current lender can definitely be the best adviser for your plan of getting a new refinancing mortgage loan. Talking to them will definitely be advantageous. Who knows that they have an option readily for you that meet your requirements?

Other Things You Need To Take Care Of

Whether you decide to take up the new loan from your existing lender or a new loan provider, it is important that you make the proper calculation. Take care of any hidden fees or costs involved with the new loan. Be sure that your monthly payment for the new loan, after taking into consideration of all hidden fees and costs, does not exceed the current loan that you are paying, or else it make no sense to pay the new loan at a higher rate.

Make A Decision Whether Such A Refinancing Loan Is Necessary

Before acquiring the loan, you should really sit down and think carefully. You need to ask yourself these questions. Do I really need this loan? What am I getting this loan for? Is this loan for the purposes of saving some money or for preventing my home from foreclosure? You need to be honest and make the necessary judgment to see whether such a loan can really help you and not putting you into more debts.

Mortgage Refinancing

The tough restrictions of Obama's Loan Modification Program are putting a strain on many homeowners as they apply for mortgage refinancing or modification. In spite of their best efforts to save their homes from foreclosure, many are losing them anyway.

In order to encourage banks and financial institutions to help these homeowners save their homes, the government offered incentives to them. But many lenders chose not to participate in the program and were not as willing to extend a helping hand to these troubled homeowners because there was just too much risk involved in extending credit to those who had gotten in over their heads in the past.

Congress stepped in and announced that it would be making changes to the Loan Modification Program, however, because the Obama Administration is directing its reform efforts to the health care system, these proposed changes will not come as quickly as hoped.

While the government drags its feet on overhauling the Mortgage Loan Modification Plan, nervous homeowners who are struggling to keep their heads above water are wondering what they can do.

Homeowners need to realize that there are other options available to them that will allow them to put off the foreclosure process. How long that process can be delayed is determined by several factors, including which method they choose and their current status with their particular lending institution.

The most commonly-used methods you can use to delay the foreclosure process are:

* Writing a Hardship letter to your lender and explaining in detail why you are having trouble making your mortgage payments. It is important to tell them what changes have occurred in your situation, such as loss of employment, death of a spouse, or some other factor that has affected your ability to meet your financial obligations.

* Requesting a formal court hearing regarding your home foreclosure and then taking steps to delay the hearing as much as possible.

* Researching every detail of your original mortgage contract to look for loopholes or errors. Any errors you find can be the basis for renegotiation with your lender because of their mistakes. Statistics show that the number of loan documents containing errors is very high.

If approached in the correct way, these methods can be very effective in delaying a foreclosure and can provide more time to find a permanent solution to your mortgage loan problem. During this delay process, you will not have to worry about paying your mortgage, so that will take a little of the financial pressure off.

It is important to remember that this is a legal process, so you must educate yourself on contract law in order to properly deal with these matters by yourself. A lawyer can be helpful in these situations, but may not be necessary. You can actually save a lot of money by taking these steps on your own, as these are the very methods that attorneys would use to delay your foreclosure as well.

How to Refinance Home Mortgage Loans at the Lowest Rate - 5 Tips

We have all heard a lot about the mortgage industry lately. Some of it is positive, but much of it is negative. The sub-prime mortgage scandal, homeowner bailouts, the freezing of foreclosures - the industry has received a lot of bad press, to be sure.

But the fact remains that the basic mortgage system is still sound and intact. And, let's face it, when you find that you want to refinance your existing mortgage in order to take advantage of lower interest rates, there really is no choice but to approach a mortgage lender to get a loan.

Refinancing does have its benefits, after all. If conditions are right - both in the market and with your current credit score - by refinancing your home loan you could stand to save thousands of dollars per year in mortgage payments. And, you could save much more than that in interest paid over the life of the loan.

Still, in order to make refinancing make sense, you will want to find yourself the lowest-possible mortgage loan refinance interest rates.

Here are 5 tips on how to refinance home mortgage loans at the lowest rate:

1. Know your FICO score:

Each and every one of us has a personal financial history. If you are over the age of 21, you likely have a history with credit cards, taking out loans, and carrying department store cards. Of course, some of us have been more consistent than others in terms of making on-time monthly payments on those various financial instruments. That type of personal payment history, combined with several other factors, determines our FICO, or credit, score.

These days, most mortgage refinance lenders focus heavily on the applicant's credit score when evaluating a new application. So, run your report and find out whether you have an excellent, good, fair, or poor credit score. The answer will have an effect on the rate for which you qualify.

2. Fix any credit glitches on your report:

When you look at your credit reports, do not just focus solely on the score. Look also at each line of your report. If you notice any mistakes, errors or glitches, be sure to get them straightened out right away so that they do not affect your chances for getting approved at the lowest rate.

3. Research at least 3 other lenders:

Start by researching 3 mortgage lenders - other than your current lender - and asking them for a refinance quote. Compare the offers you get to find out which one seems to be giving you the best deal.

4. Ask your current lender for a quote:

Now, with that best offer in mind, approach your lender for your existing mortgage and see what they can do.

5. Make sure you compare offers on an apples-to-apples basis:

As you compare the various mortgage refinance offers, be sure to compare the offers on an apples-to-apples basis. That includes everything from closing costs to interest rate to repayment term (e.g., 15 years, 30 years, etc.). Doing so is the only valid way to compare offers and find the best deal.

Refinance Mortgage Loan Compared With Home Equity Loan

Both refinance home mortgage loan and home equity loan allows cashing out the equity in a property. However, they are different type of loans, serving different needs.

Refinance mortgage is used to replace the existing mortgage with a new and improved loan. The purpose of refinance mortgage loan is mainly to lower the interest rates and the monthly payments on a mortgage. During the process of mortgage switch with refinance, providing there is equity in the property, some cash may be taken out by getting a larger mortgage. Refinance is similar to a normal mortgage in that you have closing costs and fees to pay. Refinance works well in the periods of lower interest rates. The homeowner may take advantage of lower rates by replacing the existing higher interest home mortgage with the improved one. This process will lower the interest on the entire mortgage on the house. In fact, the borrower may pay off several loans including personal loan and credit card bills with the new mortgage. By doing that the overall interest rate and monthly loan payments may be lowered substantially.

In order for refinance mortgage to be beneficial, the home owner needs to stay at least couple of years in the property to recover the closing costs and fees paid during the refinance process and start saving real money.

Home equity loans do not require the home owner to pay off the existing mortgage. They are taken as cash out in the form of second mortgage on top of the existing mortgage. The existing mortgage with its interest rate and payment terms remains untouched. The fees and closing costs on home equity loans are much lower compared to refinance mortgage. On the other hand the interest rates offered on refinance mortgage loan would be lower than home equity loan.

Home equity loans may work out better at periods of high interest rates, especially when the existing mortgage rates are lower than the rates offered currently. Home owner who needs cash and wants to tap into the home's equity to get the cash in the high interest periods could just get the cash needed in the way of additional borrowing. As the home equity loans are stand alone loans, these loans can be paid off separately from the home mortgage. The home owner may want to improve the home before selling so that it could be sold for a higher price shortly. If the home is to be sold in the near future, home equity loan would be a better option.

When deciding which financing option to choose, consider the purpose of the loan. If the mortgage applicant wants to stay at the property, but wants to lower the mortgage interest rate or change his mortgage from adjustable rate mortgage to fixed rate mortgage, refinance mortgage serves this purpose. If small amount of cash needed for a short period of time, getting a home equity loan will be a much cheaper option of borrowing for this purpose. Home owner should consider how long the house intended to be kept. If the property is to be sold shortly after refinancing mortgage, the home owner may loose money, due to the closing costs paid during the refinancing process.